Editorial roundup - Baylor scandal

The Associated Press

Published
7:00 pm CDT, Thursday, August 21, 2003

Here is a sampling of Texas editorial opinion on the Baylor scandal:

Houston Chronicle, Aug. 18:

Baylor University basketball player Patrick Dennehy is dead, another player, Carlton Dotson, is jailed on suspicion of his murder, and coaches have been accused of brushing off Dennehy's concerns over threats against his life. The NCAA is investigating whether rules against payments to players were broken. Meanwhile, practically the entire men's basketball squad is scattering to other colleges. Now, audio tapes indicate recently resigned head coach Dave Bliss tried to get players not only to aid and abet a cover up, but to besmirch the reputation of the dead player by contributing to innuendo that he was a drug dealer.

If ever there was a more sordid set of circumstances surrounding a college athletic program, it would be hard to say what it is. And that's saying something in the sordid universe of athletic scandal.

University President Robert Sloan has placed the basketball program on two year's probation and accepted the resignation of athletic director Tom Stanton _ as though these last-minute actions absolved him of his responsibility in this fiasco. As university head, Sloan bears the ultimate responsibility for ensuring Baylor runs an upright program. Having failed dramatically, it's time for him to step down. Failing that, the board of regents must make the decision for him.

The scandal is only the latest in a series of painful blows to the university under Sloan's leadership. Going back to the summer of 2000, his endorsement of establishing the Michael Polanyi Center to investigate the theory that life was created through "intelligent design" only succeeded in creating a storm of controversy. More recently his plan to enhance the school's reputation as an academic powerhouse has irritated faculty members for its emphasis on research and publishing over teaching. His ambitious building program has questionably increased the school's debt load and also pushed up tuition costs for Baylor's traditionally middle-class students. And his emphasis and approach to carrying out the school's religious mission has alienated many alumni and divided the campus.

The crisis in the basketball program is one that could and should have been avoided.

As chairman of the Baylor board of regents, Drayton McLane should show decisiveness by ridding the school of those whose weak oversight, poor judgment, sleazy morals and possibly criminal behavior have caused Baylor so much damage.

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Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Aug. 19:

How many intensely competitive coaches at topflight collegiate programs or first-tier wannabes shook their heads over the weekend as the world of Dave Bliss collapsed? How many vowed to themselves, "I'd never stoop so low"? How many lamented, "There but for the grace of God go I"?

Revelations in the Star-Telegram that the former Baylor University basketball coach urged two of his players to falsely portray slain teammate Patrick Dennehy as a drug dealer _ to protect the coach's role in violating NCAA rules _ added nightmarish scandal to what already was a tragedy.

How could any self-respecting adult, claiming to be a decent, ethical, rule-abiding coach, so abuse the memory of one player and the integrity of others? It's important to remember that Bliss, who resigned as Baylor head coach Aug. 8 after the university acknowledged major rules violations, is responsible for his own actions.

But can the latest developments in the increasingly convoluted Baylor fiasco not leave the public wondering about deeper, more insidious failings in big-time college athletics?

Is Bliss merely an overly ambitious coach whose willingness to skirt the bounds of decency and fair play finally caught up with him? Is he just a flawed individual pushed over the line by desperation?

Is he emblematic of the lengths to which many college coaches across the country will go to compete in the lucrative limelight? To what extent are universities themselves complicit as they push for glory and its accompanying gate receipts, national recognition and TV revenue?

Sadly, the problems in the Baylor program came to light only because a young man disappeared and was found dead. The deceitful nature of the head coach was revealed only because a young assistant risked his job and his coaching future to do the right thing. Those facts speak dismaying volumes about institutional safeguards.

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Austin American-Statesman, Aug. 20:

Revelations about the level of corruption in the Baylor University basketball program under former coach Dave Bliss are shocking, dismaying and still unfolding.

Baylor is the largest Baptist university in the world, and it clings tightly to its reputation as an upstanding, outstanding and godly institution. Reports of payoffs to basketball players, free cars and housing, and now recordings of Bliss smearing the name of a dead player in an effort to hide his and his program's corruption have rocked the country.

The depth of Bliss' perfidy surprised many, Baylor President Robert Sloan no doubt among them.

But there are questions that go deeper than a corrupt basketball program run by a flawed coach. And most of those questions remain at Sloan's feet, as Baylor goes forward with its investigation of the tragedy and the toxic basketball program.

Foremost for Sloan and the Baylor regents is to determine how the athletic program got into this mess. Obviously, there was much pressure on Bliss to bring the basketball team to the point of respectability. It follows naturally that the pressure could have led Bliss to cut corners to succeed, though he may have operated as a rogue coach all along in his career.

Who and what is responsible for the chain of events that resulted in a death, a cover up plot, multiple investigations, sanctions and more? Bliss has resigned, as has Athletic Director Tom Stanton, but did they have an impossible assignment from the beginning?

Sloan has said Baylor will remain in the Big 12. But it is illogical to deny that Baylor's attempts to compete may have led to its current bind, and Sloan should reconsider his position. Sloan, so far, remains determined to see that Baylor joins the ranks of the country's top universities, academically and athletically.

Ambition to such a degree can be admirable. But in Baylor's case, it has produced one crisis after another in the Baylor family: a faculty revolt, divided alumni and now a national scandal.

Sloan and the regents must ask themselves whether Baylor's strenuous efforts to become competitive in one of the largest, richest, most competitive athletic conferences in the country brought it to this pass. And they need to be sure they get an honest answer.

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San Antonio Express News, Aug. 19:

The cesspool known as the Baylor men's basketball program continues to spread.

As if drugs, murder and payoffs weren't enough, a tape secretly recorded by an assistant coach reveals now-departed coach Dave Bliss encouraging members of his staff and some of his players to mislead investigators looking into the disappearance and death of basketball player Patrick Dennehy.

The young man's body was found July 25 in a gravel pit near the campus. Teammate Carlton Dotson has been charged with shooting him to death.

Incredibly, Bliss encouraged his coaches and players to suggest to investigators that Dennehy paid his tuition and bought an SUV with money he made dealing drugs. Since dead men can't talk, the coach reasoned, no one would know the difference.

To its credit, Baylor is conducting an internal investigation into these amazing allegations.

That's the least the Waco institution can do. The NCAA should be conducting its own investigation as well.

Baylor should expand its investigation into the entire athletic program and seriously consider whether a relatively small private university should try to compete with the large, "semiprofessional" state programs that make up the Big 12 Conference.

The scandal and compromise inherent in big-time college athletics have rarely been seen in such bold relief, but few, if any, academic institutions escape the taint.

The brave thing for Baylor University to do would be to repudiate the whole system.

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The Dallas Morning News, Aug. 18:

Despicable.

That is the only appropriate word to describe what Dave Bliss was willing to do to keep his job as Baylor basketball coach.

The embattled coach was so desperate to cover up illicit tuition payments and save his own skin that he was prepared to destroy the reputation of an individual who no longer could defend himself Patrick Dennehy.

While Dennehy's family prepared for the funeral of their son, Bliss cooked up a story about the Baylor basketball player selling drugs and urged former teammates and assistant coaches to go along with the cruel deception.

It is particularly distressing that Bliss attended the Dennehy memorial services and consoled family members after he had asked the team to make the young man the fall guy in the Baylor cheating scandal.

The public revelations about the tapes have made this story worse, when many thought that wasn't possible. Former teammate Carlton Dotson is charged with Dennehy's murder. Family members say Baylor coaches were warned that Dotson was a danger to their son.

Dave Bliss' decision to compound that tragedy with lies is both heartless and, many would say, racist. He assumed that the public would buy a story that one of his African-American players was dealing drugs in order to pay his tuition at Baylor.

Bliss is finished. He never will coach again. But what transpired during his brief tenure at Baylor shouldn't be forgotten. It reflects what happens when a coach believes he has a directive to win at all costs

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Waco Tribune-Herald, undated:

In a blur of revelations, Baylor University has bolted to No. 1 in the United States in sporting sleaze lies, cover-ups and coercion stemming from murder, drugs and payoffs within the men's basketball program.

This scandal is a stunning tragedy for an outstanding institution with a proud history of integrity.

To restore Baylor's severely damaged reputation, the university must undertake extensive measures to demonstrate that everyone responsible for this disgrace is held accountable and that all sports at the university are above reproach.

Baylor also must put in place the nation's strictest safeguards to ensure that the university never again endures such a calamity.

Baylor is conducting an internal investigation into allegations involving the basketball program. That's fine. But to restore the trust and integrity lost in the scandal, a full NCAA onsite investigation needs to act independently of Baylor's investigative team.

Baylor also needs to expand its investigation into wrongdoing to include every NCAA sport it plays. If players received improper help paying their tuition and expenses in the basketball program, a full investigation should remove doubts that other sports do the same.

Baylor also should request an outside audit of its books to ensure that the university cannot be accused of sweeping financial infractions under the rug.